Reading the Bible

In Paul's second letter to Timothy, he writes, "All scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the [person] of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work" (2 Tim. 3:16).

Our church is embarking on the systematic devotional reading of the entire Bible together.

But many people complain that the Bible is not really able to be understood by most of us without reading commentaries or studying the original languages ourselves.

I'm one of those people who have spent a lot of time and money getting trained to read the Bible--and I disagree. In fact, most of the people who complain about how hard it is to read the Bible have usually not tried to read it for themselves.

The Bible is meant to be read by all of us. It was breathed by God through the obedience of human writers for our benefit. In fact, if we are to be equipped for ministry, the Bible is the training manual.

George Eldon Ladd who was Professor of New Testament Theology at Fuller Theological Seminary, in Pasadena, California, said that the Bible is "the words of God written in the words of [people] in history."

That is, although the words are from God, they are communicated through a human author in their language. And it was written in a time and place in history, and was intended to be read by particular people in history.

So, when we are reading the scriptures, let us try to understand the original author's intent as well as we can before we try to understand what it is saying to us today. This simple rule will help us as we begin to read the Bible for ourselves.